A Love Story Out of This World

When I was growing up, in St. Louis, MISSOURI, I remember when Valentine's Day came one year. I was so afraid I would get left out and not get Valentine's Day cards or candy! I said to a classmate something like, "I hope I get lots of Valentines today!" She retorted, "Lisa! Don't tell me you're greedy!" That remark disconcerted me: Does longing to be including and knowing that you're treasured and loved constitute greed? Maybe it was the way that I voiced my desire that provoked her scolding, but what longing does this time of the year bring out in us? Don't advertisers and merchants use our longing to trump up business and increase their profit margins? Doesn't our longing keep dentists in business with all the dental damage done to our pearly whites as we heed the message?

What's the Fuss About This Day, Anyway?

I know that not everyone likes Valentine's Day. It can be downright hurtful or triggering to others of you. If you are single and don't have a "special someone" in your life, or have experienced a partner breakup, will you like celebrating a day focused on love? I doubt it. If you endure a bad marriage and are just trying to survive, or have suffered a divorce, will you want to celebrate a day set aside for lovers? I don't think so! Just like Christmas, we often use this day to teach our children to think of themselves as consumers, as we believe that, to show our love, we have to get "valentine's Day" for our children. Commercials and retail stores put guilt trips especially on low-income individuals and families. "Give your Valentine the best and give a gift she won't forget!" "Come to our store or place an order at our website to make your Valentine's day unforgettable!" "Every Valentine wants a dozen roses! Get them!" Not only are people being put on guilt trips to "get that perfect gift," but we're being told what that gift should be! Really?

How Do We Define Love Today?

Yes, love Our culture has clear ideas of what love is. It's a noun, and it's something that happens to us. A feeling that takes us by storm. "If it feels good or doesn't hurt anyone, do it," Love means never having to say you're sorry," or "Forget doctrine, just love Jesus." Yes, culture is right in recognizing family love and the love between real friends. Yet culture has watered down these forms of love by giving us the idea that if a relationship become "toxic," to just dump the "toxic" person and "move on" to a new friend, a new spouse, a new partner, or a new church. Our culture celebrates love in popular song, but if you listen to the lyrics, you'll discern that the love usually being extolled is eros or sexual love. At the risk of sounding hopelessly "old-fashioned" and "behind the times," but my Bible tells me that sexual love, or sexual intercourse, is designed by God to flourish in the context of marriage. Today, our extolling eros has resulted in unplanned or unwanted pregnancies, countless abortions, sexually transmitted diseases (STD's), and countless ruined lives and broken hearts. What is love, anyway?

What is Love?

Someone defines, exemplified and lived love. He did it before St. Valentine's legacy inspired this day. Who is this Someone? God. How did He do that? He showed us, by His precepts and by His example, that love is not a noun, but a verb. It's not driven by good feelings, but by self-sacrificing behavior and commitment. He exemplified love by giving up His heavenly wealth and privileges for a time, and, in Christ, you may know very well what He did: He came to Earth and became one of us, lived a perfect life among imperfect people, and finally dying a horrible death in our place (then returning to life again!). You probably know that He tells us to love Him with all our mind, our soul, our heart, and our strength, and our neighbors as ourselves. We're even told to love our enemies! His definition of love is counter-cultural, and also often runs counter to our self-centered natures and our feelings. It usually costs us something in time, convenience, comfort, money, even our reputations or lives. Love is hard stuff but proves rewarding, though rewards may come to us much later than we'd like to see. All of us who call ourselves His followers struggle with His idea of love, which is called agape. Self-sacrificing love. We can find the power to love this way by trusting our lives to Him Who loved us first. Loving HIs way would make this world far better, and can be done every day of the year, not just on Valentine's Day. What do you think of that?

My best to you on this Valentine's Day!

Sincerely,

Lisa DeSherlia

The above photo is courtesy of MorgueFile, is by "Melodi2" and can be found here.

History of St. Valentine's Day

St. Valentine

Who Does Autism Speaks Actually Speak For?

We know that nonprofits often are the center of controversy because of questionable, unethical or even criminal conduct. For awhile, in the autism community, a raging controversy has existed. Parents of autistic children and autistic adults (self-diagnosed or officially diagnosed) have frequently been at odds with each other. The nonprofit in question is one widely trusted and supported by many families with autistic children, who have been born anytime during the past two decades and who were diagnosed in childhood. The split is based largely on how autism is seen, whether it is viewed as a disease that was caused by vaccines, or is viewed as a neurologically diverse condition. The controversial nonprofit is the best-known and largest autism nonprofit that I'm aware of.

What Is Behind the Autism Speaks Controversy?

Autism is a complex disorder that is still little misunderstood. The official diagnosis of ASDs have been around for about two decades. That is, before that, autism was only diagnosed in people who manifested severe autistic traits, called "classic autism." (Though classic autism exists in degrees just the "mild" Asperger's Syndrome exists in degrees). Many of us adults have self-identified ourselves as being possible ASD and more are being diagnosed in adulthood. Autism Speaks garners support mainly from parents of autistic children, as Autism Speaks has lots of resources and public relations to advance their agenda of promoting autism research "in search of the cure for the autism epidemic." In other words, the past two decades of diagnosed autistic children are seen as "suffering from an epidemic" and autistic adults who grew up before the "age of the autism epidemic" are hardly recognized. What does that premise add up to? It screams the message to autistic adults: You do not matter, or worse, You are imposters. Hence the hostility by so many.

My Experience With Autism Speaks

When our daughter was first diagnosed autism Pervasive Development Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS), my family and I were uninformed about ASDs. Until she was diagnosed at almost three years old, our main knowledge of ASDs was thin. As a child, I was exposed to children with classic autism and later, I went to school with peers whom I wonder would have been diagnosed with ASDs had the diagnosis been around. Because of this, we supported Autism Speaks. When they came to St. Louis, MISSOURI, to sponsor a walk one year, my spouse, daughter and I took part. However, when I self-identified myself with an ASD, set about to access an official ASD screening, and created an online Change.org autism petition for services, I came to withdraw my support of this nonprofit. My family still support it, as they still insist on viewing ASDs as a "deviance" that needs a "cure" or can be "outgrown." Our daughter, praise God! is doing very well, being mainstreamed, well-behaved, loved by her teachers, and makes good grades in middle school. Because of these happy facts, family members say that she "has outgrown her autism." I contend that her autistic traits are being modified and controlled and she is operating from her strengths. I had contacted the nonprofit about my autism petition, but though I got a response saying they would consider it, they did not follow up. I was aghast that, later, they created their own version with the focus calling for more research funds! My version calls for research funding, but focuses much more on services. But enough on me.

In the past weeks, there have been anti-Autism Speaks boycotts on the Internet, Facebook and Twitter. The hostility toward Autism Speaks has become a movement among factions in the autism community. It has garnered much more passion, sadly, than positive efforts, like mine and that of others, to get funding for autism services for all those who desire them. While I sympathize with autistic individuals who have been hurt by or are mad at Autism Speaks, I believe that our time and energy would be most effectively spent in positive action banding together and exerting pressure on the US government to fund autism services, especially for neglected autistic adults. That is what my autism petition has been meant to do. However, while many in the autism community have supported it, more seem much more passionate about ranting about the evils of Autism Speaks. I find this unfortunate, though I so understand!

To my friends in the autism community I ask: Isn't it better to champion what we are for than to rail at what we are against? What are you for?

Autism Speaks

Boycott Autism Speaks

John Elder Robison's statement about resigning from Autism Speaks